In 2017 Op-Ed, new acting attorney general said Mueller 'is going too far'

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A month before joining the Justice Department in 2017, the new acting attorney general wrote an opinion piece for CNN claiming that Special Counsel Robert Mueller had gone too far in his Russia investigation.

Matthew G. Whitaker, who was Attorney General Jeff Session's chief of staff, became the acting attorney general following Session's sudden resignation Wednesday, giving him authority over the investigation into meddling in the 2016 election.

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Mueller "has come up to a red line in the Russia 2016 election-meddling investigation that he is dangerously close to crossing," in regards to inquiries into President Donald Trump's finances, Whittaker wrote.

In August of 2017, Whitaker, a former U.S. Attorney from Iowa's Southern District — who was then a CNN legal commentator and former federal attorney and Republican campaign operative — argued that Mueller appeared to be operating beyond the mandate of his appointment.

"It does not take a lawyer or even a former federal prosecutor like myself to conclude that investigating Donald Trump's finances or his family's finances falls completely outside of the realm of his 2016 campaign and allegations that the campaign coordinated with the Russian government or anyone else," Whitaker wrote.

Whitaker went on to say that, unless Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein broadened the scope of the investigation, it would "raise serious concerns that the special counsel's investigation was a mere witch hunt," echoing a common critique of the investigation used by President Trump.

While it is not immediately clear how Whitaker will proceed with regards to the Mueller investigation, some are reading the Op-Ed as evidence that Whitaker will be more friendly to Trump's position on the scope of the investigation than Sessions. You can read the full document for yourself here.